In case you haven’t figured it out yet, Run2 is NOT a race. It is also not a walking/rambling club however. Our aim is to help people enjoy running more, enjoy running further and, in doing so, break down the mental barriers that modern day life has built up around running distances that would have been considered trivial by our ancestors.

In furtherance of those aims, we have set a maximum time for each Run2. This will vary depending on whether you are a man, a woman or a child (we have not set limits for disabled participants as we simply don’t know what appropriate benchmarks are but we would be delighted to do so if anyone has any ideas).

Maximum times are based on what we believe should be a relatively comfortable 5k pace plus a decent rest break in between. Naturally as the distance of the run increases, the pace becomes a little harder to match and the allocated stop time feels a little less luxurious. But that is kind of the point.

You can find a full list of maximum times and control break allocations here (Run2_Rules_2017_05) but the basic principle is that if you are a man and you run each kilometre in 5 minutes 30 seconds, you will get up to 20 minutes rest time at every control. If you are a woman, the target speed to get up to a 20 minute rest is 6 minutes per kilometre and if you are a child (<14), the target speed is 7 minutes per kilometre in order to get a full 20 minute break at each control. We have some ideas for a children-specific version of Run2 (Run2pointlittle1) but we’re focusing on getting the adult’s version right first.

There is no maximum or minimum stop time at any control, as long as you are there for some period (however short) after the control opens and you arrive there prior to the scheduled closing time (see run2-control-times for details). This means that you can choose your Run2 strategy flexibly depending on the distance, how you are feeling on the day, your goals for the run and who you are planning to meet up with along the route.

As well as a maximum time, each Run2 also has a minimum time. If you complete the run in a faster time than the designated minimum, we will not deem this to be a valid Run2.

Whilst this may seem counter-intuitive, the point is to discourage racing. In our view the final person to reach the last control of any Run2 has achieved just as much (and often more) than the person that is on their second cup of tea/piece of cake/pint, by the time that the slower runners arrive.

We have tried to set the minimum time at a level that still allows competent runners the chance to challenge themselves by bouncing through every control without stopping and getting to the end in a “good” time, without permitting any county bests or Strava course records. If we/you think that we haven’t got this quite right, we are certainly open-minded to tweaking the rules over time.